Shelby Said
SUCKS, In Caps
Decided to make a change in my novel in progress. This is Book Four, An Undying Quest, in the Incomplete Series.
I’m not certain but I overwrote the existing file without creating a backup. Worse, I’d decided to make this change without first backing up my work, violating my cardinal rule – backup, backup, backup, and save often.
Realizing my error immediately, I went into recovery mode. The results were depressing. No ASD files, no WKP files, or TMP files were found as a match for the initial version. No previous versions found. The file wasn’t found on One Drive.
Unbelievable. Three hundred fifty pages of the revised novel were lost.
Back to square two. I have the beta draft in its raw form. I’d started revising on October 18th, so it’s only a few weeks of work, and about half the novel.
Now I’ll walk and bash myself for being hasty and thoughtless, and take some deep breaths. It’s not the world’s end, or civilization’s end, or anything like that. It’s just a foolish setback. I’ll just need to reset myself, go back, and begin again, with some bitter lessons learned.
Done editing for today. Cheers
Surgery
Today’s editing was like surgery. I wrote Book Four, An Undying Quest, in a coffee-stoked and idea-infused blaze. Feeding me, the muses took me in different directions simultaneously. One over-arching arc was eventually uncovered as definitive. Excising paragraphs, merging, and clarifying the one great arc and staying true to the final concept and story involved a lot of reading, thinking, and revising.
Thank god for coffee. Terrific day of writing editing like crazy. Time to call it a day.
I might go get a doughnut.
ERROR!
My writing is done through typing, so this might might sound odd. Sometimes, when the words are speeding through me and I’m in the scene, I close my eyes as I type, because I don’t need to see the words. Weirdly, the words are a distraction, and get in my way. With my eyes closed, I jump into a fast rhythm.
A problem only develops when I open my eyes and discover I have one or both hands incorrectly positioned on the keyboard. It’s first funny, but then aggravating, because I was streaming, and I don’t really know what I was typing.
Yeah, just happened a short time ago, when I decided to rewrite several pages. Hoo, boy. Gulp some coffee and begin again. That’s all I can do.
I Live In My Writing
I live in my writing,
an odd place to be,
but you’d be there, too,
if you see what I see.
I live in my writing,
and lose track of time,
at least in this world,
but, to me, that’s fine.
I live in my writing,
enjoying the ambiance of life,
it’s an unlimited existence,
and has far less strife.
I live in my writing,
and some are dismayed,
so am I, really,
because I never get paid.
I live in my writing,
it’s a solitary existence,
and maybe existential,
but at least it’s consistent.
